Saturday, March 14, 2009

You know you have clay soil when...

...your raised beds hold water!

Granted, it rained a lot yesterday.

We often have standing water in the yard after heavy rains, but I've never seen it gather in the raised beds like this. They usually drain straightaway. It appears that the clay underneath the raised beds had all (the water) it could take!

6 comments:

Hi Ginger- I have raised beds similar to these. I had the absolute reverse problem in the beginning as I filled them with complete compost. They wouldn't hold water at all. So I added a few big bags of miracle grow garden soil to each one and they were perfect after that. Not very "organic" but did the trick for me. I can't wait to see more posts about your beds.-Heather

Clicked over from Blotanical to see...this is what I think I'll be dealing with soon, too. I'm putting in raised beds now and am trying to build up the soil "lasagna" style, but the soil underneath is clay. That is not my only challenge, though...I'm putting them in on a slope! So I have to level them out somehow.

JGH, it has to rain pretty hard for this to happen, so hopefully you won't be dealing with it too frequently! As far as the soil IN the beds- my raised beds are filled with a local garden center's planting mix, which is similar to the Jungle Growth planting mix you can buy in 2 or 3 cubic foot bags at Lowes (and which I recommend if you don't have quite as much space as I do to fill! it's good stuff!). Good luck!

Hi Ginger, I don't have raised gardens but definitely have those lovely puddles after all the rain we have had for the last couple of days. I'm really ready for some sunshine and warmer temps. Thanks for visiting my blog. I do hope you come back. I'll be sure to come back to yours.